Stocking.



B. W. DECKER.

Patented'Aug. 20,

\ ll l I I gH/UC ntoz .ELIIEN W. DECKER, OF NEW YORK, N. Y.

STOCKING.

Specification of Letters 1mm.

Application and m 11, 1911. Serial No. 828,480.

To all whom it may concern Be it lmown that I, ELLEN Batman, a citizenof the United States, and a resident of Mariner Harbor, Staten Island,borough and county of Richmond, city and State of New York, haveinvented a certain new and useful Improvement in Stockings, of which thefollowing is a specification.

Prior to my invention it has usually been customary to connect a hosesupporter or garter to a stockin b causing the fabric of the stockingto. be folded over the button, or equivalent device of the garter andthen engaging the gripping device ofthe garter underneath the head ofthe button in such manner as to clamp the fabric of the stock ingbetween these two parts. Under this arrangement it is inevitable thatthe strain exerted by {the garter upon the stocking comes directly upona small part only of the fabric of the stocking, and it frequentlyhappens that this strain causes a rupture of the threads or loops of thefabric with which the garter device is immediately engaged, causingunraveling, or so called run downs .which usually extend the full lengthof the stocking, in all cases injuring and in most cases destroying thesame.

Itis'the purpose of my invention to provide means whereby the garter maybe engaged. with the stocking in an altogether different manner, so thatthe strains will be brought not upon a few threads or loops only of thestocking, but will be distributed over a large number of them, andmoreover will be taken upon a reinforce piece, so that the objectionsabove referred to are avoided.

Furthermore my invention embodies features whereby the engagement of thegarter with the stocking can be adjusted circumferentially around theleg of the wearer and also vertically in an up and down direction.

Referring to the drawings, Figure 1 illustrates an elevation of a womansstocking embodying the invention; Fig. 2 illustrates a View of the topof the stocking as shown in Fig. 1, much enlarged, showing also themethod of connecting the garter therewith, the reinforce pieces beinmostly within the hem; Fig. 3 illustrates t e top of a stocking of aslightly different construction, which is represented as having been cutdown one side and opened out fiat; Fig. 4 illustrates in detail themethod of constructing the openings. It is on an enlarged scale.

In the drawings, 1 represents a ladys stocking, 2 the usual hem at thetop. It is shown as quite wide in the present mstance. Its width and infact its presence at all are, however, immaterial.

3, 3, represent what I call the reinforce strips. They may be composedof any suitable non metallic and flexible material which will not beinjuriously influenced by laundry work, preferably a strong tape. Thesepieces of tape are stitched at appropriate places to the leg of thestocking near the top and preferably on the inside thereof and if thereis a hem in the stockin I prefer to locate the strips mostly, at-Ieast,on the hem, so .that the two thicknesses of stocking material may bepresent to afford a firm foundation upon which to stitch the PatentedAug. 20, 1912.

pieces of tape. In the drawings I show the larger part of the strips onthe hem, the lower ends, however, extending below it onto the sin lethickness, to illustrate the feasibility of attaching the strips tostockings which have no hem. Suit-able openings 4, 4., are made in thestrips 3, there being corresponding openings made through the fabric ofthe stocking. In the drawings I show in Figs. 1 and 2, one only of theseopenings in each reinforce strip, but in Fig. 4 I show two of them ineach reinforce stri The advantage in having more than one is that thewearer can then engage the garter with such one of the openings asmay bepreferred, thus securing adjustability. I show eight of these reinforcestrips in Fig. 4 which, as stated, illustrates the top of the stockingcut down vertically and opened out flat, and they are so arranged thatfour of them will come on the inside and four on the outside of the legof the wearer. If this number be present, then the wearer can engage thegarter terminals with the openings ln such of the strips as may bepreferred, both on the inside and outside of the leg, thus securing thepreferred adjustment of the garter.

I call particular attention to an important feature of my invention. Itis the special manner in which the openings in the reinforce strips andstocking fabric should be made in order to secure satisfactory results.I have discovered after many experiments and tests with differentconstructions that owing to the peculiar fabric of which stockings,particularly high grade stockings, are made and the fact that they areof a knitted fabric, that ordinary stitched button holes, or anyeyeleted opening cannot beneficially be used, for a series of reasons,among them the following: The usual button hole stitchin will not holdunder the considerable strain to which the openings are subjected by thegarter devices, on the contrary, such button holes will almostimmediately break away, resulting in producing the very run downs abovereferred to, which usually in a very short time extend quite to the footof the stocking, and thus destroy it. Also if'the attempt be made to useeyelets as a reinforcing device for the said openings, then equallyserious and destructive results follow, 2'. e., eyelets are made ofmetal, usually brass or tin, and I have found by extended experiments itis impossible to use them because if the threads of the stocking fabricbe cut to allow the insertion of an eyelet, they at once spread or pullapart, so that it is practically impossible, in view of the necessarymanipulations of the parts, to secure any considerable number of suchthreads under the flange of the eyelet and even if they could be in someway held until the flanges of the eyelet could be pressed down uponthem, still, owing to their nature, they cannot be gripped by the eyeletwith sufficient force to hold them permanently. They apparently have notsufficient substance or body upon which the flanges of the'eyelet can becompressed to afford the requisite secure and permanent holding action.The inevitable spring of the eyelet when released from its compressionwill be sufficient to release the thin flimsy threads of the stocking. Ihave even attempted to put small rubber rings beneath the flanges of aneyelet and to close the eyelet down upon the rings, so that such ringsshould act as a means to grip and hold the threads of the stocking, butwithoutsuccess, the elasticity of the rubber precluding the holding ofthe threads. Furthermore the expense of this construction would beprohlbitory. The only way in which the openings can be made, or at leastthe only practically useful method is to first stitch to the stockingfabric the flexible reinforcing tape strips'described by me and then tomake parallel lines of stitching, such as I illustrate at 7. 7, in Fig.3, which are stopped off at each end by so-called bar stitching, asshown at 8, 8, which bar stitching spans across and firmly unites theparallel lines of stitching as shown, and then after this stitching ismade, to cut an opening which I indicate by the reference character 9,with a knife, which does not extend quite to the bar stitching at eitherend. In this way, and in this way only, have I been enabled to make anopening which would be satisfactory in use and have the requisitepermanence and strength.

It will be seen that under my invention the button of the garter deviceshown at 5, 5 in Fig. 2, does not have the fabric composing the'stocking bent over its top, so that it shall be clamped and strainedover the button by the gripping device 6 of the garter, on the contrary,the button 5 passes bodily through the openings in the reinforce pieceand in the stocking, and has no part either of the stocking or of thereinforce piece bent over its top, and the gripping device 6 of thegarter'engages under the head of the exposed button merely as a holdingdevice to securely retain the button within the opening. Therefore thereis no strain brought as heretofore upon afew threads or loops whichalone'are. clamped between the gripping device and the button; on thecontrary, the strain is taken by the entire area of the reinforce pieceand upon all parts of the stocking to which it is attached. Thus thestrain is extended over a large area of the stocking fabric and rupturethereof is efficiently avoided.

As stated above, the invention is applicable to mens hose as well aswomens stockings, but is especially important and valuable in connectionwith high priced goods of the latter class, because the life thereof isvery greatly extended by the employment of my invention and one of themost prevalent causes of destruction is removed thereby.

I claim:

A stocking having a hem at the upper part of the leg, separate, flat,tape-llke and flexible, reinforcing pieces of fabric materlal attachedto the inside only of the stocking and within the hem and an openingreinforced by stitching made through each of the reinforcing pieces andthrough both thicknesses of the hem of the stocking adjacent thereto,for the purpose set forth.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this specification in thepresence of two subscribing witnesses.

ELLEN W. DECKER.

lVitnesses ARTHUR DREYER,

MELVIN L. DECKER.

